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In the beginning of the Tahua text (which I believe starts on side a) we find 12 glyphs which may be connected into a whole and which possibly has as its subject the yearly cycle of the sun:

The X area with 3 glyphs could, though, also be considered as the last part of the year. But number 3 indicates that the X-area is belonging to Hina (the Moon).

12 * 30 = 360 leaves 5 days for the 'night' (Hina). Therefore also Aa1-11--12 may be considered as belonging to Hina.

10 * 28 = 280 days is the period of lively Sun, the rest of the year he is 'absent'. During those 280 days when Sun is 'present' Moon is 'absent'. Sun has 280 days and Moon has 3 * 28 = 84 days. 280 + 84 = 364 and therefore 1 day is extracalendrical.

This is a picture which may have been in the minds of the rongorongo writers. The table should therefore be reorganized into:

It seems as if Sun and Moon share the rule of the year. 10 male pillars (ana) may mark the 10 periods for the sun, but possibly there were no pillars during the 3 lunar months at the end of the year.

The X-glyph (Aa1-15), in what presumably is the gap between two 364-day periods, is definitely giving us information of an empty (time) space:

The leg at left may have a deeper and more sinister meaning, though, than what has been discussed earlier:

"... However, the dislocation [of the hip of Tantalus - like that of other sacred kings] may have been produced - and it is likely that still another method [than '... produced by wide abduction of the thighs ... when a person embarking in a boat remains undecided whether to get in or remain on land.'] was practised on a hill-top, not beside a river - there was a taboo in Canaan on eating the flesh around the thigh-bone, as is expressely stated in Genesis in the story of Jacob's wrestling at Peniel." (The White Goddess)

The right part of the glyph (which appropriately is number 15 - the day in the month when a changeover in rule is due from waxing to waning moon) is a moa (GD74), although Metoro understood the situation and preferred the word ariki.

Another view of the moa character is given by the 4 (uniformly written) toko te ragi (GD32) in Aa1-5--8. Without doubt they illustrate how the sky is 'lifted up' to let in the light. During those magic 4 * 28 = 112 days before midsummer the changes are dramatic.

 The words of Metoro at these glyphs have been translated like this by Barthel:

Could we not rather specify these 'moa' by the different ages of the manu tara youngsters:

"The arrival and the nesting of these birds at the beginning of the southern spring was the high point of the year. So great was the interest in the bird manu tara that separate names were given to the various stages of his growth: pi(u) riuriu, kava eoeo, te verovero, and ka araara (numbers 2 through 6 [misprint for 5]) are onomatopoetic names based on the characteristic bird call of each stage. At one time these names, indicating the stages of development of the sooty tern, were popular children's names ..."

I do not believe that the names being onomatopoetic explains it fully. There is a certain resemblence between verovero and erueru. The name 'ara'ara may allude to the 'road (ara) of the spider'. And most important of all: The inhabitants of Easter Island would never miss the opportunity for wordplay in naming the youngsters. 

To our civilized minds (divorced from mother nature) it feels inconvenient to 'translate' the 4 glyphs (Aa1-5--8) in two different ways at the same time:

Our analytical minds tend to exclude one of two given explanations, a glyph can hardly 'be' a 'bird' and a 'pillar' at the same time.

However, we are able to accept some symbolic explanations, e.g. that the sky 'roof' is held up by four 'pillars'. Symbolic picturesque explanations are simplifications which can be useful e.g. for telling children about how things work. There are four cardinal directions marked by four pillars far away at the horizon.

Harder to accept is the notion of growth stages in a bird as a good picture about how time proceeds. Four directions in space is easy, but four stages in time is more difficult to visualize.

In the four toko te ragi glyphs we can imagine four stylized arms with elbows at left and there are parallels in the rongorongo texts which indicate that toko te ragi (GD32) indeed should be understood as stylized arms:

'On the other hand', the gap between thumb and the rest of the fingers evidently also can be read as a mouth, e.g. in Ha5-52:

The glyphs for a.m. are written in such a way as to suggest that sun is growing because he is eating. In other words, before noon sun is still a youngster.

If we can accept that picture, which should not be too difficult, then we should also be able to understand that the four moa in Aa1-5--8 must be youngsters, symbols for the growth stages of the sun prior to apex at midsummer.